AP Enterprise: Brawl hurts Berlin Jewish community

This Jan. 7, 2014 photo shows the Neue Synagoge (New Synagogue) in Berlin. The 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, which experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, is in danger of falling apart - riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. At the center of the storm is Gideon Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)
The Associated Press

This Jan. 7, 2014 photo shows the Neue Synagoge (New Synagogue) in Berlin. The 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, which experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, is in danger of falling apart - riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. At the center of the storm is Gideon Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

This Jan. 7, 2014 photo shows the dome of the Neue Synagoge (New Synagogue) in Berlin. The 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, which experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, is in danger of falling apart - riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. At the center of the storm is Gideon Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)The Associated Press

This Jan. 7, 2014 photo shows the dome of the Neue Synagoge (New Synagogue) in Berlin. The 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, which experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, is in danger of falling apart - riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. At the center of the storm is Gideon Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

In this Dec. 16, 2013 photo, Tuvia Schlesinger listens to a question during a news conference in Berlin. Schlesinger, 61, a retired police official who comes from a Berlin family that left for Israel after the Holocaust and returned here in 1959, is helping lead a call for new elections for the leadership of the Jewish Community of Berlin. The 10,000-member organization, having experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, now fears it’s in danger of falling apart. And Berlin authorities are so alarmed by alleged financial irregularities that they have suspended millions of euros (dollars) in subsidies the community has enjoyed for decades. (AP Photo/Ferdinand Ostrop)The Associated Press

In this Dec. 16, 2013 photo, Tuvia Schlesinger listens to a question during a news conference in Berlin. Schlesinger, 61, a retired police official who comes from a Berlin family that left for Israel after the Holocaust and returned here in 1959, is helping lead a call for new elections for the leadership of the Jewish Community of Berlin. The 10,000-member organization, having experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, now fears it’s in danger of falling apart. And Berlin authorities are so alarmed by alleged financial irregularities that they have suspended millions of euros (dollars) in subsidies the community has enjoyed for decades. (AP Photo/Ferdinand Ostrop)

In this Dec. 16, 2013 photo, Tuvia Schlesinger gives a news conference in Berlin. Schlesinger, 61, a retired police official who comes from a Berlin family that left for Israel after the Holocaust and returned here in 1959, is helping lead a call for new elections for the leadership of the Jewish Community of Berlin. If that fails, many say they will break away and found their own group. "It hurts to give it all up and let it all go to the dogs," Schlesinger says. "My parents helped rebuild this community after the war. I’d hate to see it break apart completely." (AP Photo/Ferdinand Ostrop)The Associated Press

In this Dec. 16, 2013 photo, Tuvia Schlesinger gives a news conference in Berlin. Schlesinger, 61, a retired police official who comes from a Berlin family that left for Israel after the Holocaust and returned here in 1959, is helping lead a call for new elections for the leadership of the Jewish Community of Berlin. If that fails, many say they will break away and found their own group. "It hurts to give it all up and let it all go to the dogs," Schlesinger says. "My parents helped rebuild this community after the war. I’d hate to see it break apart completely." (AP Photo/Ferdinand Ostrop)

In this Jan. 7, 2014 photo, the Neue Synagoge (New Synagogue) is reflected in the windshield of a police vehicle in Berlin. The 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, which experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, is in danger of falling apart - riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. At the center of the storm is Gideon Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)The Associated Press

In this Jan. 7, 2014 photo, the Neue Synagoge (New Synagogue) is reflected in the windshield of a police vehicle in Berlin. The 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, which experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, is in danger of falling apart - riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. At the center of the storm is Gideon Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

In this Thursday, Aug. 15, 2013 photo, Gideon Joffe, president of the Jewish Community of Berlin, speaks during the opening ceremony of a celebration of Jewish culture in the Rykestrasse Synagogue in Berlin. The 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, which experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, is in danger of falling apart - riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. At the center of the storm is Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)The Associated Press

In this Thursday, Aug. 15, 2013 photo, Gideon Joffe, president of the Jewish Community of Berlin, speaks during the opening ceremony of a celebration of Jewish culture in the Rykestrasse Synagogue in Berlin. The 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, which experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, is in danger of falling apart - riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. At the center of the storm is Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

In this Thursday, Aug. 15, 2013 photo, Gideon Joffe, president of the Jewish Community of Berlin, speaks during the opening ceremony of a celebration of Jewish culture in the Rykestrasse Synagogue in Berlin. The 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, which experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, is in danger of falling apart - riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. At the center of the storm is Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)The Associated Press

In this Thursday, Aug. 15, 2013 photo, Gideon Joffe, president of the Jewish Community of Berlin, speaks during the opening ceremony of a celebration of Jewish culture in the Rykestrasse Synagogue in Berlin. The 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, which experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, is in danger of falling apart - riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. At the center of the storm is Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

BERLIN (AP) — Under the golden dome of the Berlin synagogue, elderly worshippers traded shoves and obscenities flew. A man held up his phone to film the ruckus; the leader of the city's Jews snatched it away. Then punches began to land in a chaotic scrum, a man rammed a table into another's stomach, and demurely clad women put each other in chokeholds. Police had to be called to restore calm.

The ugly scene, described in interviews with witnesses and seen on an Internet video, is indicative of a Berlin Jewish community in crisis — riven by cultural rivalries, its finances under official scrutiny. It's hard to say who is at fault, but the feuding is fed at least in part by a clash between an old guard of German Jews dating to before World War II, and a growing presence of relative newcomers from the former Soviet Union.

What is clear is that the 10,000-member Jewish Community of Berlin, having experienced a stirring post-Holocaust rebirth, now fears it's in danger of falling apart. And Berlin authorities are so alarmed by alleged financial irregularities that they have suspended millions of euros (dollars) in subsidies the community has enjoyed for decades.

"The quarrels highlight the demoralization that has been taking place in this community," Lala Suesskind, who headed the Jewish Community of Berlin until February 2012, told The Associated Press. "The community is in such a hopeless situation that even violence and intimidation are being used. That's unprecedented."

At the center of the storm is Gideon Joffe, who was elected nearly two years ago as community president, and whose leadership style has alienated members even as he comes under official scrutiny of his financial management.

The brawl in the famed Neue Synagoge on Oranienburger St. erupted last May after the Berlin Senate, the community's main source of funding, made a stunning announcement: It was cutting off payments for the community's salaries until Joffe explained why his latest budget included an 11 percent increase in subsidies for personnel costs — a jump of about 600,000 euros (more than $800,000). Joffe refused to give details of where the money would go — or even the number of staff the community employs.

The city responded by blocking the funds — and the community was unable to pay salaries.

Joffe declined to be interviewed, but his spokesman, Ilan Kiesling, speaking to the AP, said: "A small group from the opposition is trying again and again to create a bad atmosphere in public, even though the community's institutions are working very well. The opposition does in no way reflect the entirety of this community."

The Senate pays about 5.5 million euros a year toward community salaries — 40 percent of the total — and can't calculate the budget without knowing exactly how many employees are involved, city officials said. Estimates provided by Joffe of between 300-350 persons on the payroll are too vague, they said.

"We are happy to provide money to the Jewish community. We're eager to support its growth, and due to our historical responsibility we're willing to be generous," said city spokesman Guenter Kolodziej. "After the war, the rebirth of Jewish life was worth its weight in gold.